Sustenance
by K Hanna Korossy
Summary: Dean feeds off being needed. Sam feeds off his brother's love. And the thing in the basement...that's feeding off Sam.


_This story first appeared in _Road Trip With My Brother 8 _(2009), from Agent With Style_

**Sustenance**  
K Hanna Korossy

They patted the final mound of earth into place just as the first blush of dawn appeared along the horizon. Dean breathed out hard and jammed his shovel into the ground to lean on it and wipe an arm across his forehead.

"And another one bites the dust," he crowed, if tiredly. No matter how many graves he'd dug in his life, they never got easier, not even when the dirt was rich, warm Mississippi earth.

Next to Dean, Sam levered his shovel up onto his shoulder, but his eyes were on the restored grave. "Yeah," he responded simply, the syllable drawn out.

Dean glanced over at him, recognizing the tone. Something was bugging Sam, and he could lay odds he wasn't going to like whatever it was. "What?"

Sam's eyes flicked up to him, genuinely confused. "What, what?"

"What's the matter with you?"

"Nothing," Sam answered with a hint of indignation, and giving Dean a frown, started back toward the car.

Dean slipped the shovel handle through his grip until he held it balanced at his side, and set out after Sam, waiting.

He didn't have to for long. "It's just…" Sam half-turned to face him as he walked. "Didn't this seem too easy to you? Like, I don't know, something was just trying to distract us?"

Dean swallowed a groan. "Something? Dude, what're you even talking about?"

"I don't know, just… We get an anonymous tip about a case, which, by the way, when's the last time _that_ happened, Dean?" Besides coordinates from Dad, and even as Dean braced himself for the mention of their father, Sam eased around the subject. He'd gotten better at that lately. Not like Dean had noticed or appreciated it or anything. "We get to town, everyone we talk to mentions Cory Reed, all our research points to Reed, Reed _himself _tells us it's him—without throwing us into any walls or trying to strangle us, by the way—and he doesn't even show up when we salt and burn his clearly marked grave. None of that rings any warning bells for you, Dean?"

Dean shrugged. "So? Even we get lucky sometimes."

Sam snorted. "More like manipulated."

Dean narrowed his eyes at his brother as they reached the car and he opened the trunk. "You serious about this? You really think somebody set this up to, what, get us away from something big that was going down? Why us, why not another hunter? It doesn't make sense, Sam." He tossed his shovel in, waited for Sam to do the same.

But Sam was staring off into the nothing he spent a lot of time gazing at lately. "I didn't say it makes sense. I've just got a bad feeling about this one, Dean." The last was said quietly with a slide of eyes in his direction.

Sam's bad feelings warranted attention. The fear lurking in Sam's eyes stirred something even deeper. When Dean could feel little else those days, he could still feel that. He reached down to pluck Sam's shovel from his loose grasp and throw it into the trunk with the other, then looked his brother full in the face. "You couldn't just let me enjoy a simple salt-and-burn, could you."

Sam's smile flickered faintly. After the last year, Dean didn't often have to say something outright to be understood. "Sorry."

"Yeah, well. What do you want to do?"

Sam pulled in a breath, hands going to his hips as he looked around the lightening graveyard. "I don't know. Do some more research? See if something else is going on here?" Back to Dean.

"And what if we're being _distracted _from something else two states away?"

Broad shoulders shrugged. Sam had been working out a lot since the…since the hospital, like he was trying to prepare for the hunting life. Something else Dean didn't let himself think about too much. "Gotta start somewhere, right?"

Dean hitched a shoulder of his own in a non-committal response. He was willing to admit something about this hunt felt wrong, but that didn't mean he had to like it. Let Sam knock himself out figuring out the whys and wherefores. Dean himself was ready for a big breakfast and then bed.

They slid into the car and headed back the mile or so to the motel they'd checked into only the day before. The hunt _had_ gone unusually fast; Dean hadn't even scoped out the local bar scene yet. Which was a good excuse, anyway. Not that it made Sam stop giving him those annoying knowing looks.

Speaking of which, the sound of his brother's voice startled Dean. "Come again?" he said, blinking and trying not to look like he hadn't had a clue what had gone on the last minute.

Sam's expression said he wasn't buying it, but he indulgently repeated, "Pick-your-own farm back there. Remember when Dad used to stop at those whenever he saw one so we could fill up on fruit?"

It barely made him wince, really. "Hey, I go to those places all the time. Free food, dude." Although, come to think of it, he hadn't stopped at one since his brother had been back with him, and Dean wasn't sure why. They just didn't seem to take time for anything but hunting, and especially not since…the last couple of months.

"You have to work for it," Sam noted with a tilt of the head.

Dean shook himself, settling his shoulders into the jacket he'd shrugged on against the early morning chill. "What, picking fruit in the sun in a field that smells like warm pie? That's not work, Einstein, that's…atmosphere."

"Atmosphere?" Sam's eyebrows disappeared under his fringe of hair. He gave a laugh that sounded startled and delighted and was worth the price of admission right there. "I don't get you sometimes, Dean."

Dean chuffed at that. "Join the club," he muttered, turning the Impala. Despite the small size of the town, Dean had managed to take them the long way the night before…not that he would tell Sam that. Their motel was just at the end of the main strip. Well, boardinghouse really, but the proprietor had to be about ninety and Dean hadn't seen her since they'd checked in, wouldn't have been surprised if she'd up and died meanwhile, so it might as well have been a motel.

"Dean, stop."

There was no urgency in the words, no _you're gonna hit a dog! _in his tone. Just an odd empty sound, like Sam wasn't even aware he was speaking. But Sam asking was enough, and Dean stomped on the brake, then, deciding no crisis was imminent, pulled to the side of the road. Mouth opening to ask Sam what was going on, Dean instead followed his brother's line of sight to the simple two-story Sam was staring at. "Charles Vieux, Inc.," a simple sign on the red brick said, and the white-framed windows revealed the expected desks and filing cabinets inside.

None of which explained why Sam was leaning toward the car door like he was under a magnetic pull, eyes frozen to the brick façade, expression pinched and distant as if listening to a call only he could hear.

Now there was a pleasant thought. Dean cleared his throat. "Sam." The lack of response furrowed Dean's brow, and he put some force into the second try, along with a pull on his brother's nearest shoulder. "Sam."

Sam's head jerked back and he blinked, first at the building, then at Dean. "What?"

"'What'? You tell me to stop and you sit there and stare at a building like Angelina Jolie's in the window, naked, and you're asking me what?"

Sam's face folded into confusion. "I don't…" He turned to glance back at the building and shook his head. "I just…I thought I saw something, I guess. Never mind, doesn't matter." Another glance, but nothing seemed to grab hold of him this time, his expression revealing puzzlement at the previous interest.

Dean examined him a minute more, never liking a mystery when it involved Sam, but, well, it was _Sam_. A building catching his attention could mean anything from, it looked like someplace he'd gone with Jess, to he'd studied that form of architecture, to it was giving off some sort of psychic vibes Sam's weirdo abilities were picking up. Dean glared past him at the potential threat but saw nothing more than brick and mortar. One more glance at Sam, who had already taken out his journal and was checking something, and Dean gave a mental shrug and pulled back out onto the road. Not like they didn't have enough to deal with without adding random strange buildings to the list.

Besides, he was hungry, a rare event of late, and anxious to take advantage of it while it was there. Sam watched him enough as it was.

00000

Something woke him. Not just stray noises from the street or a passing dream, because there was no drowsy slide from sleep to half-wakefulness. This was full _something's wrong _alert, senses hyperaware.

And hearing nothing. Dean realized a second later that that was what had woken him. In a lifetime of shared rooms, normal was the sound of another person breathing nearby. It had taken him a long time to adjust to the silence after Sam had left and Dad had followed, and very little to adjust back after Sam's return. Now, however, Dean was by himself again.

He sat up and swung his legs out of bed in one motion, head swiveling to take in the dim room. "Sam?" They'd pulled the blinds against the daylight, used to sleeping odd hours, used to unfamiliar beds, used to everything but being alone. Sam's bed was empty, however, covers thrown back. Shoes tumbled to the floor where Sam had toed them off, jacket still tossed on the table. Dean's frown deepened as he took in the darkened bathroom beyond. "Sam?" he called a second time, knowing there'd be no answer.

Not again.

Dean cursed vehemently under his breath as he reached for his cell on the nightstand. Sam running out to the car barefoot, or going out to visit with their ancient hostess, or even just taking a walk to clear his head wasn't inconceivable. Sam doing so without leaving some note or sign for Dean, whether the hastily scrawled "Shut up" that had signaled his slipping out to meet Sarah one evening in New York, or the pyramid made out of pages torn from Dean's skin mags he'd set up on a table one morning they weren't talking, _was_. If anything, Sam had been extra careful to let Dean know where he was since it was only the two of them left. They had enough to deal with without one of them vanishing. Which meant…

Dean wasn't really sure what it meant as he stabbed in Sam's number, but it wasn't good.

The chirp of Sam's cell came from the pocket of his jacket on the table.

Dean grimaced and slapped his phone down on the bed, and reached for his jeans.

Two minutes later, he was out on the street, squinting both ways in the midday sun. In those two minutes, his mind had already seesawed so often between blind panic and furious anger, he was verging on nausea. Either Sam had done this, or something or someone had done this to Sam, and either deserved Dean's wrath in very different ways. But if it wasn't Sam… The things they fought, the enemies they made, usually played for keeps. And there was no way in Hell he was losing Sam today.

So…where was he?

The Impala sat untouched where Dean had left her, no indication Sam had stopped by there. Nor was there any sign of the tall figure on the bustling street, not that Dean had really expected there to be. He'd checked the door as he'd come out, and there had been no sign of forced entry. He would've heard a struggle, no matter how tired he was. And nothing seemed amiss in the room. But where would Sam go? It wasn't like they knew anyone in the town or had any unfinished business there. The hunt had been a slam-dunk. The only weird thing was…

The building.

Dean started running.

It was only one long block down, on the other side of the street. Dean eyed the impassive brick face as he approached, wishing for once he had Sam's spidey senses because nothing about the building seemed the least bit off to him. There were a half-dozen others like it along the road, in fact, apparently the de facto design for the town. Dean wouldn't have given it a first glance if not for Sam's reaction to it.

Still, his brother's instincts were his own. Dean gripped the handgun in his pocket as he reached the front entrance, then, glancing around, slipped around to the side.

There was one door there. Dean made quick work of the lock, only to find a cluttered storage space inside. The place was musty and clearly hadn't been opened in a while. Dean shut the door and moved on, around the corner to the back.

Two doors opened into the back street: a rear entrance to the ground floor, mirror to the one in front, and another set to the side that was recessed into the ground, offering entry to a basement level. Dean headed for that one without hesitation, once more checking for an audience before he picked the lock.

Cool air washed out of the open door. Dean set his jaw and stole inside.

The door opened into a long hallway that crossed in front of him, seemingly following the periphery of the building. Two doors about a dozen feet apart led into the bowels of the building. Dean stepped to the nearest one, finding it unlocked, and cautiously opened it.

The cage told him he was in the right place.

It was massive, planted in the nearer half of the large, open basement, as if the room had been built around it. Which it well might have, for the heavy one-inch iron bars that sketched its dimensions, about ten by ten feet.

And even without seeing his face, Dean recognized the form huddled inside it: Sam.

His eyes darted around the windowless room, but there was nothing else in it, no one lurking even in the far shadows. Just Sam and a cage, and that was enough.

Dean crept forward, attention divided between the room and what he could see of Sam. He couldn't feel whatever vibe had set his brother off, but there was a feeling of…anticipation, like a trap about to be sprung, that was tweaking all his hunter alarms, and Dean knew better than to ignore them. Even when Sam was trapped and hurt.

Still, nothing was coming after them, and Dean couldn't stay away from his brother any longer. Reaching the cage, he stuck the gun in his waistband and grasped an iron bar with one hand. He stretched inside with the other, touching tousled hair.

"Sammy?"

Sam was on his knees, back arched forward like a bow, face buried in his hands. Only as his head shot up did Dean realize he wasn't cradling his head so much as clutching it, knuckles white with strain.

Then he saw Sam's face, and his mouth went dry.

Dried and fresh blood were commingled on his lip and chin, a steady drip from his nose adding to the mess. His eyes were bloodshot and his pupils so wide, his eyes almost looked black. There wasn't a mark on him that Dean could see, yet he'd rarely witnessed his brother looking so…wrecked.

"Sam," he said urgently, thumb smearing the blood as he grabbed his brother's chin. "You okay? What did this to you?" Another glance around the room still turned up nothing, and a quick sweep of the cage didn't reveal an obvious door.

The tension in Sam's face didn't ease at the sight of him. Lines were ground into his face, his hands pressed tight against his temples. "Not did," he gasped. "Doing. Feeding… Gah! My head…" He curled forward again, eyes screwed up in pain.

_Feeding? _Dean stared at him, stunned helpless. Then, slowly, he let anger—rage—flow in instead. Cages and feeding and suffering implied a captor and feeder and inflictor, and that…that was something Dean could fix.

"Hold on, Sammy," he said gently, hand against Sam's stammering chest for a moment before he pulled himself away. Eyes flitting around the room—_feeding_, present tense, which presumably meant something close by chowing down—Dean reached inside his jacket and pulled out a flask. Never tearing his gaze away from the area around him, Dean unscrewed the flask's cap and started pouring a circle of holy water around the cage.

Inside the ring, Sam groaned and bent nearly in two, hands pulling at his hair.

"Hang in there," Dean chanted low and commandingly. Dad had always been able to order Dean to relax or calm down. Sammy… "I'm gonna end this, Sam, just give me a minute." Sam had always responded to promises.

The circle completed, Dean found another pocket and some salt. Herbs would have been better, maybe a cleansing ritual or a protection one, because no ghost Dean had heard of fed psychically on its victims. But salt was a raw element of the earth, and it had its power, too. Maybe throw in a blessing, who knows, possibly even an exorcism to cover all the bases, and it might be enough to break the hold of whatever it was that had its claws in Sam.

Sam made a soft choking sound, and Dean couldn't help throwing him a quick glance. Blood was trickling out of the side of his mouth now, Dean could see as his brother rocked up and down, and his own panicked heart sped up a little more. That could just be a bit lip, but it could be internal injuries, too, and who knew what toll a psychic feeding took, anyway? Dean cursed under his breath and poured a little faster, the salt ring just inside the water one to keep the two from mixing.

"Almost done, Sam. Then we'll see about getting you out of that cage. What is it with you and cages anyway, huh? Maybe with all that long hair, it looks like you escaped from one or something. Or maybe they're just trying to cut you down to size, Goliath."

Sam peeled away one of the hands clutched in his hair to grab tight hold of a bar instead. "Dean," he whimpered.

Dean quickly completed the second circle, then stepped inside it, dismayed to see no obvious effect on Sam. "I'm here, bro," he soothed, rubbing a thumb across Sam's knuckles as they gripped the bars. "Just hold on a little longer, okay?"

Sam's eyes widened, and he gritted out a "No!"

It confused Dean for one second too long.

He whirled in place, to see the dark, distinctly human-esque figure in the back corner. His gun was already in his hand, but one wave and the weapon went flying.

Great, another bad guy with TK. Dean grimaced, made to lunge to the side for the gun, and with his other hand let his best throwing knife fly.

It would have been on target. He could hear it thunk into the wall right where the thing had been standing. But it had just…moved, vanishing from one second to the next and reappearing opposite Dean on the other side of the two protective circles. Leering at him.

The sight of the sharp teeth in the puke-green face would've been a lot more intimidating if the creature hadn't already demonstrated its greatest threat was in its invisible weapons. Still, Dean bared his teeth in return, answering challenge for challenge. "Let him go."

An almost-white eyebrow rose in clear amusement. "No."

Dean swore. "Let him go and maybe I won't break off those pointy little teeth and stuff them up your—"

"I've been waiting for him."

The placid words made Dean startle back a step. Waiting for Sam? Not a victim of opportunity, then. Sam had felt something in that building that had felt him back. Or, crap, maybe this was even what had enticed them there, lure instead of distraction, drawing Sam in like a spider a fly.

"He tastes _delicious_," the creature added, stupidly.

Dean's hands rolled into fists.

No friggin' way. The two of them were a set now, whither thou goest and all that emo girly stuff. But it was true, and no freaking way was Sam staying there to be lunch for this psychic bloodsucker, not without his very ticked-off brother as part of the deal. Dean wasn't subdued with agony; he was quite ready and willing to fight.

Trouble was, the thing could _move_. Dean wasn't at all sure it was fast so much as able to phase somehow. Or if it was even corporeal. Which, okay, would make it a little harder to kill.

It also couldn't seem to cross the lines, though. Which protected Dean but didn't do a thing for Sam, who was still panting and moaning behind Dean, forehead nearly to the barred floor as he bowed further under the weight of the creature's attack. Dean wasn't sure what it was draining exactly, if it was something Sam could even recover from. If ending the feeding wouldn't cause some sort of psychic backlash…

And there it was, the plan that sucked the least out of a lot of bad options. No way to run it by Sam, either, just trust that his brother trusted him.

Of all they'd been through the last two months, oddly enough, that certainty was one of the few good results. It was the reason Dean had known Sam hadn't just left him again, the way he knew that even if all this went south, Sam wouldn't blame him.

It was the only way he could do this.

He pulled another knife, seeing the vamp follow its movements. But Dean didn't throw it. Instead, he surged around the corner of the cage, careful to stay within the circles, and hooked Sam's chin with the palm of his hand to draw him back upright against the cage wall, pressing the flat of the knife below his jaw with the edge just grazing the skin of Sam's neck.

Sam's pulse galloped against Dean's finger, but his brother stilled, only his chest moving. He made no move to pull away or protect himself.

Dean grasped his chin more firmly, unwilling to risk any sudden involuntary motions from Sam that would lead to him cutting his own throat. Then he leveled a burning stare at the creature. "Let him go or I'll kill him myself."

Pale eyes narrowed at him. "You wouldn't. You care for him."

Dean went for broke. "Exactly. Which is why I'd rather do it fast than let you torture him to death." He tilted the knife a fraction of an inch, careful not to draw blood, to make sure Sam could still breathe, and to support his head. They were both vibrating with tension, Dean not sure who was setting off whom.

The creature studied him, lips pulling back over teeth with a hiss. Sure acted like a vampire, even if it didn't use those fangs to suck on its food. Dean hoped it had more in common with other psychic entities they'd come across, however, that interrupting its meal would cause a backlash that would hurt it. Or, heck, he'd settle for Sam's psychic mojo being a treat it didn't want to risk losing. Dean stared back into the pale eyes implacably, banking on Sam being even a fraction as valuable to the monster as he was to Dean himself.

Sam went limp so suddenly, Dean nearly sliced his throat for him. He jerked the knife away, hands moving from head to chest, easing his wheezing brother back against the bars. "Sam?" he said sharply.

It took a few seconds, but Sam nodded a little, raised a weak thumbs-up.

Dean's shoulders came down, hands pulling back out through the bars after giving Sam a squeeze of the shoulder.

There was nothing to hold on to, therefore, when pain carved through his own brain like a drill.

Dean garbled a cry, staggering away from the cage. Out of the circle before he realized it.

The pain drained away. Before he could even react, however, a hand latched on to him by the throat, lifting and throwing him without effort across the room.

Dean slammed into the wall and fell with a grunt to a heap on the floor below.

The creature was instantly in front of him, mouth stretched wide in an obscene smile as it effortlessly dodged Dean's flailing kick. "Human," it purred as to a pet. Or a lamb about to be sacrificed.

Dean's eyes sought out Sam behind the thing's back. He missed his dad; he grieved his dad; he was broken without his dad. But Sam had always been the bottom line, the one necessity of Dean's life. His only remaining source of true joy, and real fear. He should have told Sam that, that he helped Dean cope just by being there.

But Sam wasn't looking at him. His eyes were pressed shut in fierce concentration, his mouth shaping syllables too soft for Dean to hear. Even as Dean watched him, uncomprehending, Sam's eyes flickered open and locked with his.

And Dean felt hope again.

He pushed himself up against the wall, eyes barely flicking to one side to check for… Close enough. "You tricked us into coming here, didn't you?" he spat with just the right amount of despair.

The creature gave an odd undulating shrug. "The spirit was present. I only pushed it to act. As I pulled you."

Dean straightened a little more, mentally gauging distance in his head. "Seriously, you know we're hunters, right? Kill things like you for a living? Well," he temporized, "not much of a living, but…"

The creature gave him a distinctly amused look. "You still believe you can kill me?"

Dean's gaze slid back to Sam, who bobbed his head and pushed out the last few words with obvious effort, whisper rising just enough that Dean could hear the unique tang of Latin.

"I can't," Dean said with a grin over the end of the chant. "But my brother can."

The creature screeched as Sam finished, turning furiously on him.

Dean lunged to the side for the knife buried in the wall, pulling it out and pushing it forward into the vamp's exposed side with one swift movement. As the thing bucked and screamed again, Dean pulled the blade out, plunged it into the back of the creature's neck, twisting.

The psychic vampire dropped like a pale, bloody stone.

Dean pulled in a deep breath and tossed the dripping blade away, unwilling to leave it near the creature just in case. Then he scrambled back to the cage on wobbly legs that firmed with each step. "Sam!"

Sam had collapsed onto his side on the floor of the cage, whether from the strain of the ritual or any combination of shock, blood loss, and exhaustion. His face was turned away from Dean, only his heaving back proof he was alive. When Dean reached through the bars, however, gently rolling Sam's face toward him and carding the hair out of his eyes, they slitted open, watching him impassively.

"Sammy?" he prodded. He patted a white cheek. "Can you hear me? Talk to me, man."

"'Kill 'im myself'?" Sam echoed in a whisper, then coughed, more red spilling from his mouth.

All the blood was, frankly, terrifying Dean, but he forced teasing into his tone. "Yeah, well. You know, if you get too annoying…" Lame, lame, but, God, Sam was—

"'M okay." Sam weakly pushed at Dean's hands as they checked him over. He grunted as he turned onto his side and spat blood, then lifted a shaky hand to wipe it away. "Bit my tongue."

"Your tongue," Dean repeated blankly, then incredulously. "Your tongue? Dude, I'm here worried about internal bleeding, and you bit your freakin' _tongue_?"

Sam chuckled at that, only to wince and groan as he curled up on his side. "God, 'at hurts."

"Head?" Dean ventured, sympathy returning. The flood of relief helped; Sam seemed to be getting better, anyway, faculties fully intact. Dean pushed his brother's hair back again—the kid had a lot of it—and checked his eyes. The pupils were shrinking back down, reflexes responding, the only remaining abnormality the burst blood vessels in the whites, but Sam's face was pinched with pain. Dean didn't even feel like rubbing it in when Sam dropped his head into Dean's palm.

"Mmm," the youngest Winchester murmured agreement.

Dean looked up, tracing the bars of the cage again. No door, no hinges, no openings. The thing was a solid block of bars. "How'd you get in here?"

"Can't 'member. Woke up here."

Which neatly avoided how the creature had gotten him out of their motel room, too, but Dean gave that up with a roll of the eyes. Point was that Sam wasn't getting out of there without some serious equipment, and as loath as Dean was to leave him, he had to go find some. "Okay. Uh, I need to go pick up some stuff, but I'll get you out of here soon, all right?" He quickly shrugged out of his jacket, transferring hard and lumpy weapons and tools to the floor or his other pockets before folding the coat.

"Dean."

"Yeah?" he asked, squeezing the coat in through the bars, then lifting Sam's head with one hand and sliding the makeshift pillow under it with the other.

"Burn it first," Sam whispered hard, his eyes on the dead vampire.

"You got it." Dean patted his side, then stood and crossed back to the carcass. Concrete floor and a little bit of lighter fluid he happened to have on him made the job a fast one. Who knew psychic vampires were so flammable?

The fire dying down, Dean stopped once more to check on Sam, who just offered him a weary grin. Then Dean went off in search of tools.

Sam was dozing by the time he returned. He paused to check heart rate, respiration, pupil reaction, and bleeding. Satisfied Sam was just succumbing to fatigue, Dean tugged his brother as close as possible to the side of the cage. Then he slid off his outer shirt and draped it over Sam's head and folded arms. "Just a little longer, man," he promised when Sam stirred. As soon as he relaxed again, Dean went around to the far side of the cage and got to work.

The cutting torch he'd borrowed from the mechanic down the street—really, left a fake credit card and license with the guy as collateral and everything—was unwieldy with its pair of tanks and goggles, but efficient. It took about twenty minutes to cut three bars in two places each, leaving a square gap big enough even for Sam's ridiculous size. Another few before Dean was satisfied the metal was cool enough, and then he was climbing inside.

"Sam?" He pulled the shirt off his brother's face, eyeing him critically.

Sam's grumble was sleepy, and he moaned a breath as he turned his head. Unfocused hazel peered at Dean. "Hey."

"Hey," Dean said, smiling, his stomach finally starting to settle. "You ready to move in yet?"

It was reassuring to feel how tight a grip Sam managed on his t-shirt. "Out. Now."

Dean laughed. "Copy that."

He talked for distraction as he eased Sam out, getting mumbled responses: Sam had done a cleansing ritual, the worst of the pain had gone, along with the weird feeling he'd gotten from the place. When the next question netted him an exasperated, "Dude, shut up," Dean let him be, resting him against the outside of the cage as he went for the car.

Sam slept through the return trip to the boardinghouse, Dean cleaning the blood off his face, and Dean's quick run to return the cutting torch. Sam responded to every question he roused him for, however, his reflexes were fine, and the bleeding had stopped. Just extreme exhaustion, Dean finally accepted. He stood and rubbed out the strained muscles in his back—six-foot-four was _heavy_, no matter how little Sam had been eating since the crash—watching with amusement as his brother burrowed into his pillow and blankets and sighed in his sleep.

"Make me do all the hard work," Dean grumbled without heat. Or irony. Or anything else but dizzying relief and bone-weary tired.

He sank into a chair. Immediate crisis over, the crisis of their lives returned to settle back onto his shoulders like an extra layer of gravity. Dad…Dad was still dead. And Sam, for all his newfound idealism and disinterest in school, wouldn't stick around forever. In fact, if Dad's last orders had been right…

Dean pushed it all out of his mind, shoved it behind the wall of _denial _and _later_, and lay down on his own bed.

Sam made a soft sound of pain, rolling toward him, and breathed out, "Dean."

It wasn't a plea; already his forehead had smoothed out again in sleep. It wasn't even a summons, although Dean had noticed that the cries for Jess and Dad during the nightmares the first few months had become only calls for him now. It was just Sam dreaming, but Dean turned to it, settling on his side facing him. "I'm here," he promised in a whisper. He was in pieces, but as long as it helped Sam, he would be there.

He fell asleep watching his brother sleep, like he had a thousand times before.

00000

"You realize," Sam said affably, "this isn't really work."

Dean popped another handful of blueberries into his mouth and squinted at Sam. "Dude. We're out in the field picking berries—"

"No, no, man, _I'm_ picking. You're just eating what I pick."

"—hot sun, freaky bugs everywhere—"

"They're just Japanese Beetles, Dean—they don't even bite."

"—girls in Daisy Dukes and tank tops…" Dean lost his train of thought, watching intently as the girl bent over the blueberry bush and her shirt—

Sam cleared his throat.

Dean absently dug into his brother's box for more berries and shrugged. "Yeah, okay, so maybe it's not work."

Sam snorted, shook his head, and kept picking. He always had preferred to pick a lot and then eat, while Dean was more a munch-as-you-go guy. When they were kids, he'd helped Sam add to his pile. Now, somehow, like in so many things, the tables had been turned, and he happily stole from his brother.

Dean reached for the box again.

Sam looked at him sideways, then back at the bush. He'd slept nearly twenty-four hours after they killed the psychic vamp, but two days later he was still quiet and looking a little drained. Their research had turned up a string of wasted bodies stretching across three states, a mysteriously vanished cage, and confirmation of Dean's hopes that the energy such creatures stole would eventually be replaced. It would just take time. Until then, Dean was determined that blueberries would be the most dangerous thing they'd hunt.

When Sam didn't speak—again—Dean tilted his head and decided enough was enough. "What?"

Sam shook his head, but it wasn't denial. He spoke a few moments later, his voice low and quiet. "You haven't asked."

Dean bit down on the warm berries, the burst of flavor bright on his tongue. "Asked what?" He was going for casual and thought maybe he succeeded.

"What it was like. Why me."

"'Cause you're _special,_" Dean answered automatically. He dropped onto his rear in the middle of the blueberry row, rolling the small, glossy fruit in his fingers as he paused. "Seriously? You were probably like psychic energy on steroids for that thing. Why have a sandwich when you can have a steak dinner?"

Sam's face creased. "Dude, did you just compare me to cooked meat?" Off Dean's look, he huffed and went back to picking. "And you don't think being…steak is anything to worry about?"

Dean shrugged. "One way or another, we've always been freaks, right?" He munched deliberately on another berry. "And I do know what it's like—it did it to me, too, remember?" Bad. It had been bad. He'd even had a nightmare about it, and he'd only endured it for seconds. They figured Sam had been in the vamp's hands about an hour before Dean had even realized he was gone. And Sam wasn't like him, quick to bury and move on. Honestly, Dean had never wanted him to be. He cast a speculative look at his little brother. "Why? Do you want me to ask?"

"No." Quick. Way too quick. Sam looked away, fumbled the next handful of berries so a dozen of them rained down on the ground. Those big hands could usually pick a whole bunch without losing a single blueberry. "Maybe," he finally amended.

Dean nodded again, pushing to his feet and brushing purple-stained fingers uselessly against his jeans. It was suddenly too sunny and hot out there. "Wanna go see if beer goes well with blueberries?"

"Dude, you think beer goes well with breakfast." But Sam also stood, balancing the little cardboard box in one hand while he dug into it with the other. Not having to pay for any fruit you ate was a strong incentive to stuff yourself before you left. Dean found himself snagging handfuls of berries while they walked and slipping them surreptitiously into Sam's box. Or maybe not, as Sam pulled the box away from him. Dean hitched a shoulder and ate the berries himself.

They walked slowly, both in deference to Sam's lingering fatigue and in enjoyment of the warm scents on the air, the sweet fruit. Still, there was a _but_ hanging in the air, and Dean chewed cautiously, waiting for it.

Sam offered him the box, finally, and an earnest look.

"You know I'm not going anywhere, right?"

A retort was on the tip of his tongue; it really was. Something sarcastic about not making promises you couldn't—wouldn't—keep, or maybe about him not needing reassurances like a girl. But Sam was still pale, and Dean could see the blood on his face whenever he looked away. And at least this was better than Sam's incessant prodding to talk those first few weeks. One day Dean really would need to tell him that his presence did more than any amount of heart-to-hearts ever could.

Or maybe Sam already knew.

"Yeah," Dean answered with a small smile, meaning it in that moment as much as Sam did. "I know."

**The End**


End file.
